


Guardian Angel

by inkblotbug



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Bad Ending, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Emotional Manipulation, Grooming, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Manipulative Relationship, Pregnancy, Teen Pregnancy, Trans Male Character, Trans Male Pregnancy, Transphobia, Unhealthy Relationships
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-02
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-16 17:20:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28960101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inkblotbug/pseuds/inkblotbug
Summary: Ren may have no idea how he ended up pregnant, or how he's going to handle it, but that's fine, right? That can't be as bad as having to fight a god who wanted to take control of all reality, and then your therapist who wanted to trap you in a world he controlled, right? It's fine.It's fine.(It's not fine.)
Relationships: Amamiya Ren/Maruki Takuto, Kurusu Akira/Maruki Takuto, Maruki Takuto/Persona 5 Protagonist
Comments: 4
Kudos: 20





	Guardian Angel

**Author's Note:**

> Specific content warnings for this chapter not in the additional tags: vomiting/mentions of vomiting, Ren's parents being abusive (mostly verbally and emotionally, but also a tiny bit physically), some transphobia (from Ren's parents), weight issues (re: pregnancy but also re: post-third semester ending)

Ren feels like he probably should have noticed something was wrong a lot earlier than he actually did.

To be fair, he was a bit distracted right after Maruki’s palace disappeared, going straight from the palace collapse to the Velvet Room, then to a jail cell. The adrenaline of the fight hadn’t quite worn off by the time Lavenza and Igor threw him back to reality, straight into a concrete cell with no enemies to fight and no way to escape. Following that up with a little under two weeks in jail was an awful time for his brain, and some days he was convinced he was going to just give in, break and lose that rebellious spirit the rest of this horrible year hadn’t managed to take from him yet.

By the time Sae managed to get him out, it was the day before Valentine’s, and Ren was caught up in a celebration party with the rest of the Phantom Thieves. It was loud and happy, and Ren vibrated under his skin, fidgeting from being around so many people again, unsure about how to react to everything. Then it was Valentine’s and he had to help out in the shop, then the day after and he was back to school and all his friends were giving him chocolate, then the day after and everyone expected things to go back to normal and he just wished that time would slow down and give him a break, some time to adjust to being in a world where he could go anywhere he wanted and wasn’t contained in four walls and didn’t have to face the police and could - 

“Hey!”

Ren looks around and down at Mona, then realizes he had moved from laying in bed on his phone to burying his face in the covers, his breathing harsh and unsteady. He pats the spot next to him and Morgana hops up there, curling into a ball. Ren buries his face in Mona’s side, calming himself down while the cat chatters on about anything and everything in his thoughts. 

* * *

March arrives, and with it comes a sinking feeling in Ren’s stomach. He chalks it up to having to move back to his hometown - uproot his life and friends in Tokyo and head back to a town where everyone turned their back on him after his arrest, ~~to parents that didn’t even bother to call him for the entire year he was here~~

he’s dreading the arrival of the 20th.

Days seem to simultaneously fly by and drag on forever. It’s a struggle to wake up in the morning, some days, and that isn’t helped by his entire body aching the same way it did when he spent an entire day in the Metaverse. Nights aren’t much better, and Ren spends more than a few of them tossing and turning despite his bone-deep exhaustion.

On White Day, he’s barely set foot at the bottom of the stairs into the cafe when a stomach-churning scent hits his nose. He ignores Sojiro’s concerned questioning and darts into the bathroom, where he proceeds to spend the next few minutes in front of the toilet in an attempt to not throw up last night’s curry.

After he’s out, Sojiro’s hand is on his forehead, and he’s frowning. “It doesn’t feel like you have a fever, but try to take it easy so you don’t get worse, kid,” he says with a gruff voice.

Ren nods, and makes a note to wear a mask today in case it turns out he’s caught a bug. He glances around to see if there’s anything that could have set him off, but nothing seems out of the ordinary. There’s coffee, curry… possibly the sweets Sojiro set out for customers on White Day to go along with their coffee? Ren helped make them last night and was planning on having one this morning, but his stomach rebels just thinking about food. He declines Sojiro’s offer of breakfast, planning to grab bread or something light he won’t throw up later on, on his way to school.

* * *

Once he’s boarded the train back to his hometown, he leans his face against the window, feeling the cool glass against his skin. His eyes slowly drift shut. Last night was restless, and he tossed and turned the entire time, but hopefully he’ll be able to get some rest before he arrives. The train pulls out of the station and his stomach rolls along with its movement.

Home looks the exact same as it did when he left a year ago, the same as it has every year he can remember (and presumably since before he was born). He feels like more of an outsider this time, though. Like he’s a puzzle piece picked up from the ground, shoved into a random puzzle to try and fill a gap that isn’t made for him. The dark colors of his clothes clash with the pale colors of the houses around him and he sticks out in a way he never did while in Tokyo. One of the grandmothers next door looks over at him and tuts, and his cheeks burn as he adjusts his grip on his bag and heads indoors.

His parents have already set the box he sent back earlier down in the middle of his bedroom. It’s a dusty, tattered mess, ruining the perfect hotel room that it looks like his parents changed his room into while he was gone. He lets Morgana out of his bag, freeing him to explore while he unpacks and puts his stuff away. 

There wasn’t much he could bring home, truthfully. He’d had to leave most of the gifts his friends had given him over the year in storage in Sojiro’s attic, waiting for him to come pick them up when he graduated school and could move out on his own. He’d figured he wouldn’t have the space for it, and this was confirmed when he went to put his clothes in the closet and found only about a quarter of it free for him to use. Some of the rest of the space held his old uniforms and such, things he hadn’t needed to bring along to Tokyo, but the rest of it? Old knick-knacks his mother didn’t need laying around the house anymore. And what better place to store it than in the room of her son who got kicked out of the city?

Once he’s shoved everything in the closet and managed to get the door to shut, he falls back on his bed, exhausted. It’s been a long and trying day, and he actually feels worse than he did after finishing a long run through a palace. And this time there’s no one here to help him through it. 

He shifts when Morgana jumps up beside him and starts to nudge his hand insistently. Well, he corrects himself, no one here besides Morgana. As long as he’s got at least one of his friends by his side, he should be able to drag himself through this year.

He’s counting down the days already.

* * *

The next day he’s trying on his old school uniform to make sure it fits when he frowns a little. Everything was a little big when his parents bought it, to give him room to grow if it was needed, but… it looks like the only part of him that’s grown is his chest.

And in a pretty major way, if how his uniform now fits is to be believed.

He’s been living in either Shujin’s uniform or t-shirts and an unbuttoned blazer for most of the year, neither of which are fitted around the chest in the same way his old uniform is. It’s still a distressing thought, though, that one of the parts of his body he hates the most has gotten bigger without him noticing. Surely there would’ve been a point before this where he realized it? He frowns. It’s not like he makes a habit of looking at his chest (for obvious reasons), so it makes sense, but it’s still - weird. Having his body change without him noticing. At least this isn’t anything that can’t be fixed by doubling up on sports bras to get flatter.

Something similar happens when he pulls on the skirt and fastens it shut. The waistband, once slightly too large, is now a tight fit, almost uncomfortably so, and on the edge of cutting slightly into his skin. He sits down on his bed to test it and decides that while uncomfortable, he can put up with it for the rest of the year, as long as he doesn’t grow anymore. The discomfort is far outweighed by how terrible having to ask his parents for a new uniform would be. He adjusts it up and down, trying to find a place where it will fit but won’t cause his teachers to get on his case about delinquency for having too short a skirt.

It must be the lack of going into the Metaverse, Ren decides. Climbing around in there burnt up a lot of calories, and he still has the same appetite he had as Joker, except now he’s not doing any exercise to work all that energy out. Basic biology says that means he’s expected to gain some weight. There’s not much he can do about it here unless he wants to continue the same activity level, and he doubts anyone in town would look kindly on him climbing around buildings. His parents would throw a fit.

It’ll be fine. He’s only got to get through a year here before he can move back to Tokyo. He can make it a year.

~~He ignores how, if he thinks about it a bit more, he should be losing weight considering he’s been feeling sick most mornings, and throwing up a couple times. It’s nothing.~~

* * *

It’s a boring April day shortly after school has started. Ren’s browsing his phone in bed when he rolls over onto his stomach and pauses when that movement makes something feel _wrong_. It’s not like he’s nauseous, it’s just… uncomfortable. If he tried to pinpoint it, it’s a bit like there’s more mass than there has been, like his weight has shifted without him realizing it. Group chat now forgotten, he sits up and moves his hand down to his stomach. There’s definitely a weird bump there. He pulls his shirt up to examine it closer, poking it a bit and tracing patterns into it. It’s firm, but not hard. Not something that feels wrong, more like he’s - 

His thoughts stop, but his brain’s already hurtling down a path he never wants to think about.

It’s literally impossible. This isn’t him exaggerating, it’s actually literally impossible for him to be pregnant. He’s never slept with anyone, ever, despite what the other students in his hometown have been whispering about due to his status as the “Tokyo delinquent”. He was kind of too busy to do anything resembling romance or sex in the past year, ~~and the only person he wanted to~~ and he knows his life has been weird lately, but he doubts that pregnancy is a side effect of persona usage. Like, if this was a thing, someone else on the team would have run into it before now and spoken up about it, wouldn’t they?

And okay, he hasn’t actually had his period for the past month or two, but that’s normal. He’s been under an incredibly high amount of stress, between the palace and jail and having to prepare to go back home. His health classes in school had mentioned (before he stopped paying attention, trying not to break down in class at the mere thought of his own reproductive system) that it was normal for periods to be irregular for teenagers. Admittedly, he’s been pretty regularly having them for a few years now, but he’s still within the time span for it to be settling down and being weird sometimes, right?

Right?

* * *

After a few days full of his traitorous brain tormenting him with what-if scenarios (and he’s sure Morgana’s noticed something’s wrong by now, there’s no way he hasn’t seen Ren freaking out), he gives in and hops on a bus, heading to a convenience store that’s hopefully far enough away that no one there will recognize him. He’s brought along his fake glasses, and it’s still cold enough out that he can shove his scruffy hair under a beanie, trying to make himself look as different as possible. It’s like he’s back in his first few days in Tokyo, where all he had wanted to do was to blend in and not make a scene.

The cashier doesn’t comment on Ren’s nervous fidgeting while he’s being checked out, and he’s glad for it. He doesn’t think he could handle small talk or questions right now. As soon as he’s gotten his bag, he heads outside and shoves it into the pocket of his oversized hoodie (left behind by Ryuji at some point), and thinks about where to head to next. He’d quickly scanned the instructions in the store, and knew he had to go to the bathroom to do the test, but he didn’t want to just do it in the store he’d bought it in. No way he could bring it home and do it there either - while no strangers would be able to see and judge him for being irresponsible enough to need to do this, his parents would definitely find out and he’d be fucked.

Eventually he winds up in an out-of-the-way park bathroom, praying no one will suddenly feel an urge to head to this section and need to go. He unpacks the test and re-reads the instructions in more detail, flushing bright red as he follows them. Three minutes then pass, with Ren tapping his foot anxiously against the floor to mark time. Once it’s been long enough, he flips it over and takes a look.

It’s positive.

He tries another one, just in case the first one was fucked up somehow.

Also positive.

Oh _fuck._

* * *

The rest of April passes in a haze. He hadn’t been able to avoid Morgana when he got home, pale and looking like he was about to throw up for reasons besides morning sickness. Morgana had been worried, especially when he’d been asked to not mention it to the other Phantom Thieves during their weekly group check-in calls, but Ren had told him he just needed a few weeks to get all the details sorted out, to find some way to try and explain it to them.

Not that he’d made very much progress at that. His mind was a chaotic maelstrom of thoughts, pelting and tormenting him every hour of the day, but trying to figure out how to tell his friends hadn’t even come up a single time. There were other things that needed to be figured out first: should he be thinking about getting rid of it? Was he even allowed to do that? How was that even supposed to work, like was there a time limit? Did his parents have to give him permission for it? Would he be able to hide it from his parents, if he didn’t need their permission? They’d already been upset enough that he’d been deviating from the schedule they carefully planned and presented to him when he returned, meant to “keep him out of trouble and keep the reputation of this family (that you ruined last year) intact”. If he had to break that schedule and head out of town again (because there’s no way he would be able to do it in this town), he’d end up in massive trouble, and his parents would probably keep an even closer eye on his comings and goings than they had been.

But on the other hand, there’s absolutely no way he’d be able to hide an entire pregnancy from his parents, full stop. He was already starting to show - his body had been on the leaner side as Joker, had been even thinner after he got out of jail, but now it was becoming soft and squishy to store up energy. The bulge on his midsection was slight but definitely there. From what he’d looked up in a wild research frenzy one night when he couldn’t sleep, he knew it was going to continue to grow, and even more rapidly than it had been already. His uniform was already getting hard to button up, and fuck, the switch to summer uniforms was coming up faster and faster. There’s no way he’d be able to get away with using coats and sweaters to cover things up like he currently was, his teachers would get him in trouble the second he walked into the building while being a fraction out of uniform.

There’d been a couple more search binges to see if he could answer any of his questions without having to ask someone for help in person, but they’d all led to him coming away more confused and worried than before. Okay, so no one had ever been in his exact situation before, but hell, he didn’t even know what his situation is! He might not know that much about pregnancy but school and the internet had taught him that he’d need to sleep with someone with a dick to get pregnant. And though the rest of school was sure that that was how he’d passed his probation, he hasn’t. He’s never even kissed anyone, much less had sex. 

His symptoms don’t subside now that he knows what’s going on; if anything, they get worse. He feels nauseous almost all the time, and one of his classmates bringing the wrong food for lunch can send him racing for the bathroom. A quick online search tells him to snack throughout the day. It’s not easy, especially when the teachers have been informed by his parents to watch him extensively, but he’s had practice trying to hide Morgana from the teachers, and ginger gum is easy enough to hide and grab a piece when needed. He needs to visit the bathroom more often, too, and winds up there after almost every class. His chest aches with heartburn. 

And besides the physical symptoms, besides his mind whirling trying to figure out what to do, a small part of his brain has decided to dedicate itself to panic about everyone else potentially figuring it out. He’s paranoid in everything he does. When it comes time to change for gym class, he hides himself in a corner, swiftly swapping clothes and hiding his body with his uniform as best he can. (Truth be told, that’s how he already changed for gym class half the time, but now he has to be extra cautious when he does so.) His brain is completely exhausted from stress, which makes it harder to think things through, which piles on more stress, and continues on in a horrible ouroboros. 

Somehow, he manages to make it to the end of the month before things go wrong.

* * *

Ren spends his days with his brain half hidden in fog. That must have been how he fucked up so bad.

He’s preparing to get in the bath, carefully avoiding the mirror so he doesn’t have to see how he looks in someone else’s eyes, not wanting to face how much his reflection has started screaming out “look at me I’m a woman!”. The doorknob rattles, and he has a split second to panic.

Shit.

When he got back to this town, one of his parent’s demands/orders was that his mother was allowed to do random check-ins at any time of the day, to ensure he wasn’t doing anything illegal. Whether he’s sleeping, talking with his friends, or even taking a bath. At first he’d tried to get through it by laughing at the thought of his parents thinking he was doing drugs or something in the bathroom, trying to ignore the terrifying feeling of always being a second away from being spied on, but those fears had ramped up majorly once he found out he was pregnant.

And now he’s taken too long to do anything, too petrified from fear and indecision, and he’s completely fucked.

His mom’s rant about how lazy he is for not being in the bath already cuts out after a few words, and he knows she’s noticed his body. All he can do is stand there, frozen, as her face darkens and she steps forward.

The next few hours are a blur.

Slices of time stick in his brain like shards of glass, cutting abruptly in and out of focus. His mom is dragging him into his room, standing there shouting at him while he frantically pulls on sweatpants and a t-shirt. He’s halfway down the stairs, being dragged by his arm to his father’s office. Absently, he notes the grip on his arm, thinking in a kind of floaty way that it’s probably started to bruise already, and he should be careful to wear long sleeves the next few days. Skip ahead and he’s being shouted by both parents as he stands between them, nowhere to run, nowhere to look where he won’t have to see at least one of their glaring, sneering faces. Accusations, digging in like knives, saying how they knew he wouldn’t have been able to behave himself on probation. He’s a stain on the family name. He’s a slut, a whore, good-for-nothing bitch. They’re brainstorming ideas on how to “cure his rebellion”, they’ll check his room for drugs and take his phone to read through his messages. Maybe they can even find out who the kid’s father is, his father jokes, and his mother sneers out _if he even knows who it is_ , making Ren flinch. It isn’t until one of them mentions “the only good thing about this is that you’ll finally shut up about pretending to be a boy and learn your place as our daughter” that he breaks, and his mind clouds over in anger.

In the end when he comes back to himself he’s sitting on a park bench. Morgana’s curled up in his lap and purring, loudly, like the hum of the Monabus’s engine. He’s barefoot, wearing only the t-shirt and sweats his mother had allowed him to pull on before dragging him downstairs, and even though the days are getting warmer, it’s still cold enough outside at night to make him shiver. Morgana looks up at him, and when he moves to look down at him he finally speaks up.

“Are you better now?”

Ren nods, and Mona hops down onto the bench next to him (it’s becoming more uncomfortable for both of them when he sits on Ren’s lap, nowadays). He has no idea what to do now. There’s no way he can go back to his parents’ house, not even if he had the desire to put up with them again. He vaguely remembers shouting back at them, something he hadn’t managed to do even when they didn’t support him after his arrest, and their fight was loud enough the neighbors probably overheard everything. His mom’s probably given up on him already and moved on to damage control with the neighbors, telling them all about how she kicked her delinquent daughter out of the family in a desperate attempt to restore her standing in the neighborhood’s eyes with him as a sacrifice. 

There’s no way he can stay here, it’s impossible, but where else is he going to go? Leblanc? He’s already put enough of a burden on Sojiro in the past year, he can’t ask him to take him in now and add a _baby_ in on top of that, but - he doesn’t know anywhere else? He couldn’t burned his friends with that, at all, he can’t let them find out ever ever _ever_ , but he has to - he has to - 

“Ren?” rings out through the park, cutting through the nighttime silence, and his eyes snap to the source.

Maruki is there, in a car parked on the side of the road nearby, leaning out the windowsill to be able to see him. His eyes are a bit wide, but when he notices Ren looking at him he waves, a bit awkwardly. Ren finds himself stumbling in Maruki’s direction, thankful to any and every deity he can think of that someone he knows is here. Maruki exits the car as Ren gets close, rubbing his neck and looking kind of embarrassed.

“Are - you - is something wrong, Amamiya-kun?” 

Ren looks up at him, but his brain is short-circuiting, caught up trying to find the words to explain what’s going on. Maruki goes to say something a few times, stopping short each time. He eventually sighs, combing a hand through his hair as he looks down at Ren, gazing directly into his eyes. “I was passing through here - on my way back from dropping someone off in a town further away - when I noticed you running towards the park. I was a bit concerned that you were out here all alone, at night, so I figured I’d check up on you. I understand if you don’t exactly want to talk to me, given… well, everything that’s happened in the past few months, but… just know that I’m always there if you need someone to talk to, okay?”

And with that, Ren breaks again.

He looks up and he’s in the passenger seat of Maruki’s car, knees curled up to his chest, eyes sore and damp from crying. Maruki’s hand is on his back, rubbing in small circles to try and calm him down, and the man himself is looking at him kindly. He glances around, noting that Mona’s sitting and watching from the back seat of the car. All he can see outside the car is trees, and a small path back to a main road - it looks like Maruki must have driven them somewhere out of town while he was crying.

“Are you back and able to focus now?” Maruki queries, and Ren nods. He un-balls himself, trying to sit back in the seat, and Maruki moves his hand away, letting it rest on the edge of Ren’s seat. He catches Ren’s eyes again. “I’m guessing that you got kicked out of your house for being pregnant. Is that right?”

Ren nods again, not trusting his voice to come out if he tries to talk. Maruki’s face grows soft and concerned as he asks “Do you have any place to stay now?”, and even more so when Ren shakes his head in response.

Maruki breathes out, slowly, purposefully, like he’s attempting to center himself. “I know trusting me might be a lot to ask from you right now, but if you wanted to - well. My current apartment has two rooms, and the second one isn’t currently being used. If you - if it’s okay with you? I can afford rent currently, so you wouldn’t need to chip in for anything, you could just focus on -”

He probably continues after that, but Ren’s stopped paying attention, trapped in his head again. Fuck. He’d forgotten about rent - he hadn’t had to pay anything when he stayed with Sojiro, not rent or food or whatever you’d have to pay when living on your own. There’s no way he could ask Sojiro to cover things if he showed up at Leblanc with another person there, especially not an infant - fuck Sojiro had already done so much for him that he didn’t need to do, there’s no way he could just make him take Ren back in and struggle to take care of three dependants when - 

“Ren?” a voice cuts through the haze his thoughts have become.

Maruki. Right. Maruki - 

who is sitting right in front of him, worry in his eyes, and is already fully aware of everything Ren’s going through. He wouldn’t have to explain anything to him. And he’s offering to let Ren stay at his place for free, giving him time to just try and sort everything out without having to worry about housing or food or anything, and… 

It’s not like Ren’s forgotten that it was only a few months ago he was in a fistfight with this man, because he just wouldn’t stop controlling the world like some sort of god. He hasn’t. But the Phantom Thieves changed his heart, he saw the palace collapse around him. It’s different now.

Ren looks straight up at Maruki, who’s staring at him with a worried expression, and nods firmly. Maruki’s whole frame lights up, losing tension, and he smiles. “Oh, good! I didn’t want to press the issue, but, well… I can only imagine what you’re going through right now, and if there’s any way for me to make that easier for you, I’d love to help out.”

Rearranging himself in his seat to be more comfortable, Ren manages to give a weak smile in reply. Maruki beams, turning back to the wheel of the car and shifting it into motion, slowly heading back towards the road. Back to Tokyo.

* * *

As Maruki pulls his car into the parking spot for a decent-looking apartment, Ren lets himself out of the car, then opens the back door to pick up Morgana and bring him inside. Maruki, once he’s turned the car off, beckons Ren inside and up the stairs to the second floor. When they reach the apartment door, Maruki unlocks it and ushers Ren and Morgana inside ahead of him. Ren steps inside, taking a look around as Maruki enters and locks the door behind him.

It’s not a total mess inside, though it is a lot more disorganized than the attic. The door opens directly into a small living room, kind of cramped, with a couch in the center and bookcases filling up the rest of the space, papers spilling off the shelves and onto the floor. Ren can see what looks like a kitchen off to one side, and a small hallway to the other that he’s guessing holds the bedrooms and baths. He turns as Maruki steps up beside him, noticing the frown on his old counselor’s face.

“Listen, Ren,” Maruki begins, and Ren’s concerned already. “I hate to have to do this, but… I unfortunately forgot until now that my lease doesn’t allow for pets on the premises. I can allow Morgana for a night or so,” he says, holding his hands up like he’s trying to calm a scared child, “but we’ll have to figure out something long term, in case someone comes and inspects the place.”

Give up Mona? God, that’s one of the absolute last things he wants to do. Mona’s stuck by him since the very beginning, the first member of the Phantom Thieves. The only time he’s ever left Ren was the few days during Okumura’s palace, when he ran off because he didn’t feel appreciated. With that exception, he’s been a constant since almost the day they first met. It’s been over a year of being together. Mona’s a comfort to him, the thing that made it bearable to go back to his parents’, the last tangible link he had to the Phantom Thieves. 

But.

Maruki’s letting him stay here. He would never be able to live with himself if he got Maruki in trouble, when the other man is going out of his way to help him out. He could keep Mona with him if he went to Leblanc, but the very thought terrifies him. He couldn’t even get the words out to explain what was going on when Maruki knew what was happening, he couldn’t explain to Sojiro. Couldn’t bear the thought of disappointing him.

Maruki seems to sense that Ren’s starting to panic, and lays a hand on his back, steering him down the hall and into a bedroom. It’s a mess, clothes strewn everywhere on the floor, and books piled up on the nightstand, but the bed is clean and full of blankets, even if it’s unmade.

“Don’t worry about this for now. We can figure it out in the morning. Just try to sleep, you look like you need it.”

With that he shuts the door behind him. Too tired to try to process everything that’s happened, Ren flops down on the bed. He’s out like a light.

* * *

In the morning, Ren wakes up from the first full, calm night of sleep he’s had in weeks. Morgana’s lying on top of him, purring happily, but when Ren shifts, Mona looks over and stops, jumping down to sit beside his face.

“Ren,” Morgana whispers. Ren blinks back at him. “I heard what Maruki said about me not being able to stay, and… I think it’s a good idea for me to go.”

Ren bolts upright, blankets pooling around his waist, and stares in alarm at Mona. “No! You can’t… you can’t…”

“Yes, I can!” Mona speaks up. “You need a place to go, Maruki has space, and he could be really helpful. If I can help you out by leaving, I wanna do it! I wanna make sure you’re okay, even if that means not being able to see you for a while!”

A half hour, a whispered conversation, and a good deal of crying later, the bedroom door opens and Morgana steps out, with Ren trailing behind him. They find Maruki sitting at a table in the kitchen, a couple packets of convenience store pastries and a coffee sitting in front of him. Morgana hops up onto the table and claims one of the pastries, and Maruki smiles around his coffee. Ren claims the other chair, dragging one of the pastries over to him and tearing it open. Determined to get the words out before he can go back on what they decided, he blurts out, “Morgana and I decided that you should take him and drop him off at Leblanc, so he can stay with Futaba.”

Maruki looks over at him and his face gets soft. “Of course I’ll do so, Morgana. And Amamiya-kun? I know this must have been a hard decision for you, and I’m proud of you for having the maturity to choose the option that’s best in the long term.” Ren looks down at his pastry, face flushing. 

After breakfast Maruki carries Morgana down the stairs and outside, but not before Ren makes sure to nuzzle and hug Morgana one last time. Once the door’s shut, he turns around and heads towards the bathroom Maruki had pointed out to him earlier. “I keep spare supplies in the bathroom, you can use them to wash up and get ready,” he had assured him.

And indeed, there’s a packaged toothbrush, new tube of toothpaste, and some spare washcloths piled on the counter, next to a well-worn toothbrush in a holder. He starts to brush his teeth, but while he’s doing so his mind catches on the fact that Maruki had a toothbrush ready for him. Was that… a normal thing for adults to do? Ren has no idea. His parents only ever had enough toothbrushes for everyone in their family, and they replaced them before they started to wear out, so they never had extras. They never had guests stay overnight, either - most of their guests were business partners of his father, and they all left after a long dinner and drinks. There wasn’t exactly room for anyone else to stay over in Leblanc, either, so he had no experience to figure out how a good host worked. 

He finishes getting ready, grimacing as he sniffs his shirt and realizes he grabbed a dirty one off the floor when he left. Shit, he hadn’t been able to take a bath last night either, he must stink right now. He’ll have to ask Maruki how he does laundry at some point once he gets back, so he can get into some clean clothes.

* * *

When Maruki returns, Ren’s waiting for him, curled up on the couch under one of the blankets that had been sitting there. It smelled the same as the ones in the bedroom: kind of dark, all musk and deep scents that fill his head whenever he breathes in. Maruki unlocks the door as he steps inside, breaking into a smile as he notices Ren sitting on the couch. 

“Did you have a chance to get cleaned up, Amamiya-kun?”

Ren nods, then pauses, hesitating. Maruki seems to sense his reluctance, frowning a bit as he removes his shoes and hangs up his coat. Before he can turn around, Ren blurts out his question, stammering halfway through when Maruki turns to look at him. “Did you - is - do people normally keep spare toothbrushes and stuff in their bathroom?”

Maruki seems to think over what he’s going to say carefully in his head, before walking over to the edge of the couch next to Ren, resting his hand on the back. His eyes are filled with an emotion Ren can’t identify, and his face reminds Ren of when he’d said no to taking his deal to remain in the false reality.

“I’m going to try to phrase this as best I can, but… yes, typically, people do keep spare things in their apartment or house in case a guest comes over. It’s to try to make sure their guests are as comfortable as possible, to try and make them feel at home, and to show you care about them and their comfort. It’s something that’s completely normal, and I’d actually worry more if someone let another person stay at their house and didn’t set up supplies and a room and such for them. You don’t have to thank me or feel indebted at all.” He gives a small grin, then walks off into the kitchen like he hasn’t made Ren’s core turn cold.

Oh. 

He’d always kind of known his parents didn’t really care about anyone, but one of the things Maruki said - _try and make them feel at home._

Ren… wasn’t exactly sure what a home was supposed to feel like. To him, home had been just a place that existed, like school and workplaces and a train station, something used for a few select purposes and nothing else. At school, you learned and occasionally went to clubs. At work, you did your job. At a train station, you caught a train to your destination. At home, you made food and slept, and did whatever other household things needed to be done, since no one else was there to do them. You lived with your parents, and siblings if you had them, but that was just convenience, a way of making sure children learned how to care for themselves before leaving the house and going to university so they didn’t have to inconvenience anyone else by relying on them for food and shelter. 

He’d had a thought in the back of his mind that he was missing something, some quality that made home really “home”, especially since the trip to Hawaii the previous year. Everyone had been so excited to go to Hawaii, but they’d been equally excited to return once the trip was over. It wasn’t a desire to return to a normal routine either. Ryuji had gone on and on about being glad he was going to get to sleep in his own bed, his own room, and to get to see his mom again and tell her about everything he’d seen and done, to give her the souvenirs he’d bought, and everyone else had shared that sentiment. Ren had bought souvenirs, but. That was just what you did when you returned from somewhere, wasn’t it? You brought something back for the people who lived in the same house as you, a token, to apologize for the inconvenience of messing up their routine. But how everyone else had acted...

Maruki’s apartment was the most - welcome? The most welcome that he’d felt in a long time. Maruki had set out supplies for him, even if they weren’t specifically for him, had tried to make sure he’d be comfortable. His parents had barely made space for him when he came back from Tokyo, they’d never go as far for him as Maruki had.

And. Fuck. Ren hated to admit it, because of all Sojiro had done for him, but… he hadn’t exactly had the warmest welcome at Leblanc, either. Sojiro had given him food and a place to sleep, yeah, but that was the same thing his parents had given him, repeated but with new characters and a new setting. He didn’t want to criticize Sojiro, the man had eventually warmed up to him and had done so much for him, he hadn’t needed to take Ren in, but. 

His musings are interrupted by a crash from the kitchen, the clattering of multiple pans falling out of a cupboard and onto the floor, and a curse from Maruki. He darts into the kitchen to see if he can help.

The thoughts still lurk at the back of his mind.

* * *

That night, Maruki walks out of his room, having changed into pajamas, and notices Ren sitting on the couch in his same sweats, hair limp from a lack of washing. He tells Ren to head into the bathroom and draw up a bath, and when it’s halfway full, Maruki knocks on the bathroom door. Ren lets him in and is handed a pile of clothing in exchange. 

As he unfolds them to get a better look, Marui explains what he’s handed over. “I noticed you didn’t have pajamas, and you can’t really be comfortable in those same clothes all the time. Even if you wear them as often as possible, you’ll still have to put them in the laundry at some point. I had an old shirt lying around, and figured it was big enough you could probably wear it to bed. I didn’t have any spare pants - I wasn’t sure what size you were - so…” he trails off as Ren looks down at the large pair of boxers he’s holding in his hands. They’re bright red, and covered in novelty sushi rolls. There’s absolutely no way Maruki bought something like this.

“It - your hips are wider than anything I own, and you need room to grow in, and. This was a gag gift?” 

Ren looks back up at Maruki, who has folded in on himself. He’s not exactly wrong, either. Ren had taken a peek in his closet earlier, and there was no way Ren could fit in even the stretchiest of Maruki’s pants comfortably. Besides, it was getting to be hotter and hotter, and from his last summer in Tokyo, Ren knew he’d want to be in as little clothing as possible to survive the heat. 

“It’s fine. Thank you, Maruki-sensei.”

Maruki perks up, leaving Ren to his bath. Ren tries to enjoy it, while also hurrying through in case Maruki is going to take one after he finishes. 

But out in the living room, when he asks that exact question, Maruki shakes his head. He’s settled on the couch under a blanket, leaning back against a pillow, with a book propped up in his lap. Ren frowns at the sight. He hadn’t paid that much attention, but… “Is this where you slept last night?”

“Yes, why - oh, don’t worry about it at all!” Maruki seems keen to reassure him. “It’s not a burden for me to do so, and you need the bed more. The second room isn’t exactly set up for anyone to sleep in right now, and since that’s my fault, it’s only right I take the couch until it’s ready. Just relax, and get some rest. It’s fine.”

And with that thought in his mind, Ren heads back to the bedroom. It feels darker, lonelier than it did last night, the absence of Morgana already making itself felt. His breath is the only one he can hear, and there’s no second heartbeat there to reassure him if he wakes up from a nightmare. It’s uncomfortable. He’d never noticed how used he got to sleeping with someone else beside him, how much of a difference just knowing that someone was nearby had on reassuring him.

He turns over, curling himself in the sheets, and breathing in deeply. Musk and warming, deep scents fill his head. 

At least he has Maruki to count on.


End file.
